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In Tampa, With Panama Up Next

Sorry it has been so long since my last entry, I’ve been a little busy with traveling and what not. So I’ll try to get everyone up to speed.

Since my last post a lot of things have happened that most of you probably already know.

I was selected to join the national team to participate in this year’s Gold Cup. So over the past two weeks I have been traveling and training in preparation for the tournament. I departed for training camp after our Red Bulls game against Vancouver, and have been bouncing around the country ever since.

Juan Agudelo and I flew to Cary, N.C., to meet up with the team in preparation for the friendly against Spain. Let me tell you, it was so hot when we were down there — close to 100 degrees every day! It’s not exactly easy to train in that kind of heat. Training went off without any problems and it was great to see all the guys again and catch up with them.

From Cary we flew to Boston to play Spain in a final friendly before the all-important Gold Cup began.

I won’t lie, the Spain game was a rough game and one that we learned many lessons when looking back. That team is so good. Their movement without the ball and their vision with it makes it ridiculously difficult to defend them. They were all over us the entire first half. The second half was a little better on our end; we were able to defend better and make more passes, which alleviated some of the pressure. Once that game was over we had to put it behind us because we had our first Gold Cup three days later. Sure, we looked at video and discussed the good and the bad. But we used that to help us going into our next game.

The next game was against Canada. They are definitely our rivals to the north and we wanted to play a good game and come out on top. I got my first start in my first meaningful national team game. A win would start us out on the right road to winning the group stage. Over all, we played a solid game with a few hiccups here and there. It was easily my best game in a U.S. uniform.

Timmy Howard came up huge at the end of the game; as you could tell, many of us were getting a little fatigued. A solid shutout win was exactly what we needed after the thumping Spain put on us.

We are now in Tampa, Fla., for our second game of the group stage. We take on Panama tonight at Raymond James Stadium, home of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Everyone is champing at the bit ready to go for this game, and looking forward to putting in another good performance. A win tonight would guarantee a spot in the quarterfinals. So with that in mind I need to start getting prepared mentally for the game.

On a side note, the Red Bulls pulled out a much needed win last night after a rough go in the month of May. I’m proud of the guys and the heart that they showed.

I’ll see you in New York in a few weeks.

Red Bulls defender Tim Ream, in his second year in M.L.S., will be contributing to the Goal blog during the club’s season.

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Goal, The New York Times soccer blog, will report on news and features from the world of soccer and around the Web. Times editors and reporters will follow international tournaments and provide analysis of games. There will be interviews with players, coaches and notable soccer fans, as well as a weekly blog column by Red Bulls forward Jozy Altidore. Readers can discuss Major League Soccer, foreign leagues and other issues with fellow soccer fans.